Passenger Lists to India from the UK - 1850s - Hallifax & Cox

[Chris Duff]

In 1860, Benjamin Wilson Hallifax and Mary Ann Cox were married at the Church of St. John, Calcutta.  Benjamin was from Islington, London and Mary Ann was from Tiverton, Devon.  Where did they meet?  On a boat to India?  Which boats and when?  Was Mary Ann on her own?  Was this an elopement?  So many questions and no answers!

We know Benjamin, born 1833, got a job as Assistant to the Bengal Secretariat when he got to India sometime in the 1850s.  He later became a prosperous manager and proprietor of a 400-acre tea plantation and left nearly 30,000 Pounds when he died in 1906 back in England.  We know nothing of Mary Ann, born 1836, apart from the census records up to 1851 when she lived with her mother and father, Robert and Maria, in Tiverton.

If anyone has access to passenger lists to India in the 1850s, can you please either do a look-up for me or give me the sites so I can search myself.

Many thanks.
Chris

[jorose]

There aren't regular passenger lists that I know of but some shipping records can be found on:
http://www.new.fibis.org/

Many of the earlier records have people listed as just Mr/Mrs/Miss etc.

Did Benjamin have any connections to Tiverton/relatives there? Perhaps he met her on a trip back to the UK, and later sent for her to come to India so they could marry.

[t mo]

hi chris
just a little aside that may interest you looking in general for Benjamin hallifax I found this .
blundells school speech day an A G Hallifx was given a blundells scholarship to balliol college oxford he was a son of Benjamin hallifax of darjelling india , taken from the Exeter and Plymouth gazette  29  june 1886 .
regards
trevor

[Chris Duff]

Thank you, Trevor and Jorose, for your quick response and interest.  Yes, Trevor, A G Hallifax is one of mine.  I hadn't seen this newspaper item - thank you for pointing this out to me.  Is there a newspaper archive site you use which you could pass on to me?

I found that out the hard way, Jorose!  All research sites seem to concentrate on North America and Australia for passenger lists.  I will certainly get on to Fibis to see what I can find.  As far as I know, there would have been no reason for Benjamin to be swanning around the Tiverton area in the 1850s.  He would have been in his early twenties and Mary Ann a late teenager or just into her twenties.  But you never know.  One day, something will turn up if I keep asking around.

All the best,
Chris